Ts'ao Ju-lin (1876-4 August 1966), pro-Japanese official at Peking who was one of the principal targets of the May Fourth Incident of 1919.

Born at Shanghai, Ts'ao Ju-lin was the son of Ts'ao Yü-ts'ai, a scholar who held the shengyuan degree. The young Ts'ao was given a thorough grounding in the Chinese classics. At the age of 13, he also began to study French. He abandoned classical studies in 1895, after China's defeat in the Sino-Japanese war, because he believed that the old system of education had failed to prepare China for the new problems it faced. He then enrolled at the Hupeh Railway School in Wuhan. In 1897 he married Wang Mei-lin. Two years later, he went to Japan, where he studied law at Waseda University and then at Chuo University in Tokyo. Upon his return to China in 1904, Ts'ao passed the special examinations for students returning from abroad and received the degree of chin-shih in law from the Ch'ing government. In 1905 he became an apprentice secretary in the Board of Agriculture and Commerce and a lecturer in law at Imperial University (later Peking University). He also helped organize the bureau of constitutional research and compilation and the bureau of law codification. When Komura Jutaro, the Japanese foreign minister, came to Peking in November 1905 for negotiations regarding Manchuria, Ts'ao because of his Japanese educational training was transferred to the Board of Foreign Affairs as an apprentice secretary. He served as an attache to the Chinese delegation in the negotiations that resulted in China's acceptance of the territorial disposition made in the Treaty of Portsmouth, which had ended the Russo- Japanese war. The agreement signed between China and Japan on 22 December also granted Japan the right to hold concessions in Mukden and other Manchurian cities. Ts'ao thus was introduced to international diplomacy. He then became a junior secretary in the Board of Foreign Affairs.

It was natural, given Ts'ao's legal training, that he should be involved in the establishment of provincial assemblies in 1909 and in the inauguration of a national assembly in 1910. Also during this period, he was sent to Manchuria to conduct investigations which apparently had something to do with the "rehabilitation" of the region as set forth in the Sino-Japanese agreement of 1905. He submitted detailed recommendations regarding Manchurian administration, and his proposals were well received by the Ch'ing court. About 1910 he was appointed junior vice president of the Board of Foreign Affairs.

After the revolution of 191 1 and the establishment of republican government in China, Ts'ao Ju-lin became a personal adviser to Yuan Shih-k'ai. When the new Parliament convened at Peking in 1913, Ts'ao was present as a senator representing Mongolia. He was a member of the Chin-pu-tang [progressive party], which supported Yuan in his struggle with the Kuomintang. In July, he was named to the 60-man committee which was responsible for drafting a permanent constitution. The following month, he was appointed vice minister of foreign affairs. After Japan declared war on Germany in August 1914, attacked at Tsingtao, and advanced to take over Germany's privileged position in Shantung, Ts'ao acted as chief aide to Sun Pao-ch'i (q.v.) in negotiations with Japan. The Japanese presented their Twenty- One Demands to Yuan Shih-k'ai's government in January 1915, whereupon Sun Pao-ch'i resigned and Lu Cheng-hsiang (q.v.) was reappointed minister of foreign affairs. Although Lu signed the agreement with the Japanese on 25 May, Yuan Shih-k'ai and Ts'ao Ju-lin were responsible for the Chinese side ofthe negotiations leading to that agreement. Lu and Ts'ao both came under popular attack for their roles in this matter, but Yuan refused to accept their proffered resignations.

When Yuan Shih-k'ai launched his campaign to become monarch in the summer of 1915, Ts'ao Ju-lin supported him. That October, Yuan bestowed a title upon Ts'ao which in effect gave him a rank equal to that of the foreign minister. And in December, Ts'ao became a member of the enthronement preparations office. Yuan's monarchical plan failed, and in March 1916 he turned to Tuan Ch'i-jui (q.v.) for help. Tuan became premier in April and organized a cabinet in which Ts'ao was minister of communications. When Lu Cheng-hsiang resigned in May, Ts'ao also became acting foreign minister. However, with the death of Yuan Shih-k'ai in June and the accession of Li Yuan-hung (q.v.) to the presidency, Ts'ao lost his cabinet posts and temporarily retired to private life. In the autumn of 1916 Ts'ao Ju-lin gained the interest and confidence of Tuan Ch'i-jui by presenting him with a master plan for the military unification of China. According to this plan, the Japanese would provide funds for the strengthening of Tuan's military establishment, and Ts'ao would handle the negotiations with the Japanese through his friend and schoolmate Chang Tsung-hsiang (q.v.), then the Chinese minister to Japan. Tuan appointed Ts'ao managing director of the government-operated Bank of Communications. Lu Tsung-yü, who was a friend of Ts'ao and who had preceded Chang Tsung-hsiang as minister to Japan, also became associated with the bank. Thus the stage was set for the implementation of Ts'ao's plan to obtain Japa/iese aid.

In January 1917 Ts'ao negotiated a loan of ¥5,000,000 from a consortium of three Japanese banks and agreed that the Bank of Communications would engage Japanese advisers. But this loan was of minor importance. For the full implementation of Tuan's scheme, China would have to declare war on Germany so that Peking could turn to Tokyo for "war loans" for the building up of the Peiyang armies. These armies then could be used to effect the unification of China. Li Yuan-hung, however, opposed the idea of participation in the First World War. In February, Ts'ao was made a member of the "International Affairs Study Association," organized by Tuan for the nominal purpose of deliberating upon China's policy with reference to the war. While applying pressure on the Parliament through this and other groups, Tuan continued, through Ts'ao, to negotiate secretly with Japan.

Japanese leaders perceived that the situation developing in Peking might prove advantageous to them, and in early March a delegation headed by Nishihara Kamezo as personal representative of Premier Terauchi arrived in Peking for negotiations on the matter of financial aid. Ts'ao's proposals in the secret discussions that followed, according to revelations made by Eugene Ch'en (q.v.) in his Peking Gazette, aimed at securing a loan of as much as ¥100,000,000, munitions, training officers, and arsenal technicians.

The struggle between Tuan Ch'i-jui and Li Yuan-hung reached a new stage with the dismissal of Tuan from the premiership in late May 1917. However, the situation was reversed with Li's abandonment of the presidency and Tuan's return to power in July after the restoration attempt of Chang Hsün (q.v.). On 17 July, Ts'ao Ju-lin became minister of communications in Tuan's reorganized cabinet. Tuan promptly declared war on Germany, and in September the first of the so-called Nishihara loans was negotiated. Although Tuan was forced once more, in November, to relinquish the premiership, he retained much of his power, and Ts'ao was able to keep control of the ministry of communications. When Tuan returned to the premiership in March 1918, he gave Ts'ao the additional post of acting minister of finance. By this time, Ts'ao had established himself firmly as the leader of the so-called new communications clique—as distinguished from the old communications clique of Liang Shih-i (q.v.)—and he became a prominent member of the Anfu Club, organized in March by Hsu Shu-cheng (q.v.). That September, four more Japanese loans were negotiated, bringing thetotal of the Nishihara loans (according to a Japanese source) to some ¥-1 77,000,000. Given the circumstances under which they were negotiated and the fact that the National Government of 1928 claimed to have come into possession of no records of the transactions, the exact total may never be known. In any event, the loans were never paid.

In return for these loans, the Peking government made valuable concessions to Japanese interests in connection with mining, banking, the construction of railroads and telecommunications systems, the supply of military equipment, and "rehabilitation projects." Moreover, on 24 September 1918 in an exchange of notes with the Japanese foreign minister, Chang Tsung-hsiang made an unfortunate lapse in stating that "the Chinese government gladly agrees" to Japan's proposal regarding her position in Shantung.

In October 1918 Ts'ao Ju-lin became commissioner of a new currency bureau, with Lu Tsung-yü as his director general. He then resigned as acting minister of finance but continued to serve as minister of communications. In January 1919 he also gave up the currency bureau post. That month, the Paris Peace Conference convened. How this conference dealt with the Shantung question was of major importance to China. As the conference progressed and the extent of Chinese concessions to Japan became known, however, it became apparent that China would be unable to dislodge Japan from its position as the inheritor of Germany's privileged position in Shantung. Chinese public fury mounted as a result of these revelations, and Ts'ao Ju-lin was, of course, a target of this wrath. The arrival of Chang Tsung-hsiang in Peking on 30 April and the fact that he chose to stay at Ts'ao's home rather than his own gave rise to rumors and to the organization of Peking students for protest action (for details, see Lo Chia-lun). The demonstrations on 4 May began peacefully enough, but after the student march was halted at the entrance to the Legation Quarter, some of the demonstrators marched to Ts'ao Ju-lin's house, where they believed that Ts'ao, Chang, and Lu Tsung-yü were holding a secret conference. They shouted such slogans as "death punishment for the traitors, Ts'ao, Lu, and Chang." The students stormed the house. Lu was not in the house; Chang was beaten into insensibility; and Ts'ao escaped through a window and took refuge in the Legation Quarter. His house was burned, and a number of students were arrested. The indignation which resulted from the arrests transformed the incident into the beginning of the May Fourth Movement. Because ofcontinued agitation against the "three traitors," Ts'ao, Chang, and Lu were dismissed from their posts on 10 May.

Ts'ao Ju-lin retired from public life to become manager of the Exchange Bank of China and a director of the Industrial Bank of China. In January 1922 he was made special commissioner for the promotion of industries, but he was removed from office that June when Li Yuanhung returned to the presidency. Thereafter, Ts'ao confined himself to his business interests. He remained in Peiping throughout the Sino- Japanese war and the Nationalist-Communist civil war until 1949, when he moved to Taiwan. After living with a daughter in Taipei for a year, he moved to Japan and lived in Tokyo for seven years. In October 1957 he went to the United States to live with his youngest daughter. Ts'ao Ju-lin died in Detroit, Michigan, on 4 August 1966. Ts'ao K'un T. Chung-shan ft,